Information is a currency.
And in Stonefold, it's more valuable than coin, blade, or blood.
Tarn didn't give me a map, a list, or a hint. Just a challenge: *"Bring me a secret worth more than three silver coins."*
I don't ask what kind of secret. If I can't figure that out on my own, I've already lost.
I spend my first night near the blacksmith's yard, curled beneath a broken cart. I listen to guards drinking, to merchants arguing, to thieves boasting about what they stole and who they sold it to. Most of it is useless noise. But I start learning what to *listen for.*
Not what they say.
But what they're *afraid* to say.
By the third night, I hear it.
Two men. Leaning close in the alley behind the inn, whispering like the air itself might turn against them.
"She said she's got a ledger," one hisses. "Names, times—proof of trade with Hollowspire smugglers."
"She's mad, showing her face again. Tarn hears about this—"
I step out of the shadow.
"Too late," I say.
They freeze.
I raise my hand before they can draw anything. "I'm not Tarn. I just work for him."
A lie.
But a convincing one.
They panic. They *believe.*
"She's staying at the Dry Needle," one blurts. "Room three. Her name's Kassa. She's a scribe—used to run with the blackscrolls."
That's all I need.
I slip away before they regain their nerve. By morning, I'm standing outside the Dry Needle, pressing a stolen copper into the innkeeper's palm.
"Room three," I say. "I'm her younger brother."
He doesn't even check.
Kassa's door is locked.
I pick it.
Inside, the room is empty—but messy. Papers scattered. A bag half-packed. And there, near the bottom of a torn satchel—*a small leather book, wrapped in cloth.*
The ledger.
I don't take it.
I copy it. Fast, careful, silent. Just like I used to copy market signs as a kid to learn what each symbol meant.
And when I hand the copied pages to Tarn that night, he stares at me for a long time.
Then he says, "You're not just smart."
"You're *hungry.*"
I say nothing.
He places a pouch of silver on the table. More than ten pieces.
Then he leans closer.
"I could use someone like you. Someone quiet. Observant. Someone who makes people talk without them even knowing."
He pours dark liquid into a glass.
"To secrets," he says.
I don't drink.
But I nod.
Because I've just learned something more valuable than any silver he gave me:
**Power starts with knowing what others are afraid to lose.**
And right now, *no one knows who I am.*
That makes me the most dangerous person in this room.